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Can you really die of a broken heart?

You have lost someone precious–a partner, parent or pet--and grief has completely engulfed you. Most people will say that time will help you heal. But what if we told you that sometimes, you don’t heal at all and that heartbreak could actually kill you?

It’s true. A broken heart can actually kill you. How else do you explain the fact that barely 24 hours after her daughter and Star Wars star Carrie Fisher passed away, her mom and Hollywood legend Debbie Reynolds, 84, suffered a stroke and died. “The last thing she said this morning was that she was very, very sad about losing Carrie and that she would like to be with her again. Fifteen minutes later she suffered a severe stroke,” her son Todd Fisher said.

The Mayo Clinic in the US calls it the ‘broken heart syndrome’. According to them, ‘the blood pumping in and out of your heart becomes temporarily disrupted by a surge of stress hormones, which are secreted in response to devastating news. Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, as the broken heart syndrome is medically called, was first acknowledged by Japanese researchers in 1991. The symptoms include sudden chest pain and shortness of breath and is often triggered by a tragic event.

This was further studied by researchers from the Minneapolis Heart Institute who pored over the medical histories of 200 Takotsubo cardiomyopathy patients to identify symptomatic clues. The study was published in the American Journal Of Medicine and revealed that this was an overwhelmingly female-dominated condition since a mere 10 per cent of the subjects were male. If your health is fragile, you are more likely to die of a heartbreak.

So how do you get over a broken heart and survive? Here are a few things that can help:

Talk to someoneDon’t clam up. Talking to a confidante, friend or family helps. It releases pent up emotions and stress, thereby healing you somewhat.

Think happy thoughtsYou must have a lot of memories with the person you lost – both happy and sad? Let go of the sad ones and what could have been and relive the happy ones. And learn to let go.Take up new habitsIs there something you have always wanted to do but haven’t got around to doing yet? It could be something as simple as getting rid of the clutter in your house. Distract yourself and remain occupied so that you don’t go over the same thoughts again and again.